In this article, we explore the tension between truth telling and the demands of civic life, with an emphasis on the tension between serving one's country and reporting the truth as completely and independently as possible. We argue that the principle of truth telling in journalism takes priority over the promotion of civic values, including a narrow patriotism. Even in times of war, responsible journalism must not allow a narrow patriotism to undermine its commitment to truth telling. Journalists best fulfill (...) their civic role by adopting the perspective of a democratic patriotism. We conclude that if news organizations accept the primacy of truth telling and democratic patriotism, they should not embed reporters with military units, or if they do, they have an ethical obligation to implement special editorial precautions. (shrink)

Many believe that the ethical problems of donation after cardiocirculatory death (DCD) have been "worked out" and that it is unclear why DCD should be resisted. In this paper we will argue that DCD donors may not yet be dead, and therefore that organ donation during DCD may violate the dead donor rule. We first present a description of the process of DCD and the standard ethical rationale for the practice. We then present our concerns with DCD, including the following: (...) irreversibility of absent circulation has not occurred and the many attempts to claim it has have all failed; conflicts of interest at all steps in the DCD process, including the decision to withdraw life support before DCD, are simply unavoidable; potentially harmful premortem interventions to preserve organ utility are not justifiable, even with the help of the principle of double effect; claims that DCD conforms with the intent of the law and current accepted medical standards are misleading and inaccurate; and consensus statements by respected medical groups do not change these arguments due to their low quality including being plagued by conflict of interest. Moreover, some arguments in favor of DCD, while likely true, are "straw-man arguments," such as the great benefit of organ donation. The truth is that honesty and trustworthiness require that we face these problems instead of avoiding them. We believe that DCD is not ethically allowable because it abandons the dead donor rule, has unavoidable conflicts of interests, and implements premortem interventions which can hasten death. These important points have not been, but need to be fully disclosed to the public and incorporated into fully informed consent. These are tall orders, and require open public debate. Until this debate occurs, we call for a moratorium on the practice of DCD. (shrink)

Dimensions of character are often overlooked in professional practice at the expense of the development of technical competence and operational efficiency. Drawing on philosophical accounts of virtue ethics and positive psychology, the present work attempts to elevate the role of ‘good’ character in the professional domain. A ‘good’ professional is ideally one that exemplifies dimensions of character informed by sound judgement. A total of 2340 professionals, from five discrete professions, were profiled based on their valuation of qualities pertaining to character (...) and judgement. Profile differences were subsequently examined in the self-reported experience of professional purpose towards a wider societal ‘good’. Analysis of covariance, controlling for stage of career, revealed that professionals valuing character reported higher professional purpose than those overweighting the importance of judgement or valuing neither character nor judgement, F = 7.92, p <.001. No differences were found between the two groups valuing character, irrespective of whether judgement was valued simultaneously. This profiling analysis of entry-level and in-service professionals, based on their holistic character composition, paves the way for fresh philosophical discussion regarding what constitutes a ‘good’ professional and the interplay between character and judgement. The empirical findings may be of substantive value in helping to recognise how the dimensions of character and judgement may impact upon practitioners’ professional purpose. (shrink)

The curious case of Bronze Age Pervert (BAP, for short), of unfortunate name, or “handle,” in his world. Author of the self-published Bronze Age Mindset (2018), BAP is present in 4Chan discussion threads and on YouTube, and he produces weekly subscription-only podcasts with approximately 6,500 paying clients (I am among them). He was banned from Twitter but reinstated in December 2022, and he now has over 100,000 followers. A Google search turns up scores of articles addressing or discussing his work, (...) all written in palatable forms. But BAP’s own subjects and rhetoric are for adults only. Who is BAP, what does he espouse, and what compels the attention of orthodox Catholics? (shrink)

In 2012, a U.S. Institute of Medicine report called for a different approach to health care: “Left unchanged, health care will continue to underperform; cause unnecessary harm; and strain national, state, and family budgets.” The answer, they suggested, would be a “continuously learning” health system. Ethicists and researchers urged the creation of “learning health organizations” that would integrate knowledge from patient‐care data to continuously improve the quality of care. Our experience with an ongoing research study on atrial fibrillation—a trial known (...) as IMPACT‐AFib—gave us some insight into one of the challenges that will have to be dealt with in creating these organizations. Although the proposed educational intervention study placed no restrictions on what providers and health plans could do, the oversight team argued that the ethical principle of beneficence did not allow the researchers to be “bystanders” in relation to a control group receiving suboptimal care. In response, the researchers designed a “workaround” that allowed the project to go forward. We believe the experience suggests that what we call “bystander ethics” will create challenges for the kinds of quality improvement research that LHOs are designed to do. (shrink)

This scarce antiquarian book is a facsimile reprint of the original. Due to its age, it may contain imperfections such as marks, notations, marginalia and flawed pages. Because we believe this work is culturally important, we have made it available as part of our commitment for protecting, preserving, and promoting the world's literature in affordable, high quality, modern editions that are true to the original work.

James Ward was Professor of Mental Philosophy and Logic at the University of Cambridge. First published in 1899, this two-volume work consists of his Gifford Lectures, delivered between 1896 and 1898, in which he criticises Naturalism, and Agnosticism, in favour of Idealism, in which spiritual and non-material phenomena are central to human experience. The lectures in Volume 1 set Naturalism and Agnosticism within the context of the Mechanical Theory, arguing against its claim that experience can be fully described (...) in terms of mechanical concepts such as motion, energy and force. Exploring the ideas of prominent thinkers such as Newton, Huxley and Spencer, these thought-provoking discussions continue to inform and evoke debate among philosophers and natural scientists. (shrink)

This cutting edge volume provides an overview of the dynamic new field of cyberphilosophy – the intersection of philosophy and computing.

Philosophers have often bluntly said, and more often tacitly assumed that careful and reasonable men will confine themselves to two very rigid ways of talking. Vile must either show that what we say is a theorem deducible from assumed axioms and postulates, or we must show that what we say is made probable by evidence. This book is at heart an attack upon the idea that rationality requires any such straitjacket, and it repudiates the dichotomy between "analytic" philosophy and philosophy (...) "in the grand tradition." Rationality is here conceived as a subtle and complex temper of deciding, most needed precisely where what we have to say cannot be stuffed into the two narrow pigeonholes in question. Originally published in 1957. The Princeton Legacy Library uses the latest print-on-demand technology to again make available previously out-of-print books from the distinguished backlist of Princeton University Press. These editions preserve the original texts of these important books while presenting them in durable paperback and hardcover editions. The goal of the Princeton Legacy Library is to vastly increase access to the rich scholarly heritage found in the thousands of books published by Princeton University Press since its founding in 1905. (shrink)

James Ward was a renowned philosopher and psychologist who criticised the objective principles of scientific naturalism. Believing in the primacy of the subject–object relationship for human experience, he rejected the detached perspective of the sciences; coming to the final conclusion that matter is fundamentally derived from mind, and mind is given coherence by the existence of God. This metaphysical belief was derived from his observations as a psychologist during the earlier part of his career, and his understanding that (...) the subject cannot be reduced to a passive receiver of the objective world. This volume, which was originally published in 1911, was based upon the Gifford Lectures given during the years 1907–10. It constitutes a further development of Ward's beliefs into the form of a complete system, and it remains of value to anyone with an interest in philosophy, psychology or phenomenology. (shrink)

The lively and colorful story of the important role played by a curioously neglected French journalist in the First Vatican Council (December 1869–July 1870).